Friday, May 4

Here's a bit of an update about what I've been doing the last two days. On Thursday I met with my other flight instuctor from Premier Flight Academy, Alex. We spent all morning going over the different types of flight instruments and how they all function. We went into a lot of detail about the inner parts of the instuments and how they function, or what can possibly happen if they break during flight. We reviewed the difference between Pitot-Static instruments and gyroscopic instruments again. Something interesting that I learned on Thursday is that if both the pitot tube and the static ports get clogged or iced-over and no inner static port is available for use, you can actually break the glass on the vertical speed indicator (the instrument that measures your rate of climb) and it will restore pressure to the instruments in order to get your altimeter back to (somewhat) working order. After the instrument review, we dug into the snooze fest of FAA regulations (the FAR-AIM), a lot of which was discussing what you can do with certain pilot certifications. For instance, on a private pilot certificate, you cannot fly for hire unless it is for a charitable organization; you can't fly for hire unless you have commercial piloting privileges. Friday I met with my sponsor to discuss some of the most important regulations: airspace. In short, there are airspaces A-G which all have different regulations which must be adhered to or else suffer consequences from the FAA, NASA and other air traffic officials. During my flight time, I will be flying in mostly E and G airspace. E is anything under 14,500 feet that does not interfere with G airspace. Both VFR and IFR airplanes and pilots can fly in this space. G airspace is any airspace that is near an airport, approximately 700 or 1200 ft depending on the area around it. Unfortunately, our time today had to be cut a bit short since I had a funeral to attend this afternoon. But, we will pick up right where we left off on Monday!